Google planned to announce on Tuesday that the source code for its mobile operating system, Android, is now available for anyone to use free.

The move was expected, although the timing was uncertain.

Developers can find the source code on the Web site for the Android Open Source Project.

"An open-sourced mobile platform, that’s constantly being improved upon by the community and is available for everyone to use, speeds innovation, is an engine of economic opportunity and provides a better mobile experience for users," said Andy Rubin, senior director of mobile platforms for Google, in a statement.

The first Android phone isn’t yet on the market -- the G1 goes on sale in the United States from T-Mobile on Wednesday. Journalists were first able to publish reviews of the G1 last week.

Google expects that by making the source code for the operating system open, a wide variety of applications will appear, as will less expensive and faster phones.

But Google’s model for Android has some critics. The LiMo Foundation, which publishes specifications for middleware for mobile Linux devices, and of which Google is not a member, says that Google’s model might be too open.

"There’s a debate about whether Google’s approach to openness is sustainable and good for the industry," said Andrew Shikiar, director of global marketing for the LiMo Foundation.

Android will be released under the Apache license, which doesn’t require developers to share their changes to the code back with the community, he said. This is one of the reasons why some people wonder whether Android will become fragmented as various incompatible versions of the software appear in phones across the market.

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